Tuesday, December 31, 2013

FULL TEXT (Article 1 of 4): Daytona, O., Oct. 14. – Mrs.
Mary Belle Witwer, who has been held as a suspected wholesale poisoner, was
arraigned in police court this afternoon on the charge of murder in the first
degree.

The affidavit was sworn to this morning by Chief Detective
Frank McBride, and it is charged that she did willfully, purposely, and by
means of poison, kill and murder Anna C. Pugh by them and there knowingly,
purposely, and unlawfully administering a large quantity of poison, arsenic.
When arraigned before Police Judge Snelker, Mrs. Witwer entered a plea of not
guilty.

The hearing was set for 9 o’clock Friday morning. Before
then Professor Howard of Columbus will have reported in his examination of the
remains of two alleged victims of Mrs. Witwer – Mrs. Anna C. Pugh and Frank D.
Witwer.

~ Meets the Challenge Calmly. ~

Mrs. Witwer displayed little sign of emotion in court. The
prisoner was told today of the Middletown report that she had been married five
times instead of four, and that had deserted her after a brief time, taking
$400 of her money. She denied the story. There has been little found by the
police in their investigations.

The affidavit was filed today upon instructions from Coroner
Hatcher and Chief of Police Whitaker, who, it is understood, had arranged with
her attorney to either take this action or to release her.

Mrs. Witwer is seen by no one now except her attorney and
the detectives. She declines all interviews.

~ Suspected of Causing Eighteen Deaths. ~

Although Mrs. Mary Belle Witwer is suspected of poisoning
not fewer than eighteen persons – men, women, and children – among them four of
her husbands, there is not at this

The analysis of telltale organs of two of the dead will be
concluded within a few days, and then, if no poison is found, the woman must be
set free. If these persons did not die of poison is found, then beyond all
doubt all of the others died natural deaths.

~Her Story of Her
Career. ~

In Mrs. Witwer’s own recital of the facts of her career she
has told of the deaths of seventeen persons with whom she came in contact, has
acknowledged to four husbands, all dead. According to investigation, she had
still another husband, who left her a few days after the marriage ceremony and
is still alive. She also lived with a person not set down in her story, who
also died suddenly.

Mrs. Stowe became the housekeeper for Witwer, and was
married to him on March 10 last. On July 4 Witwer was a corpse, having
succumbed to acute stomach trouble.

At the time of the illness of Witwer the doctor was puzzled
over the strange actions of his patient. He would apparently grow better than
worse. The afternoon of the night her died Witwer was seemingly so much
improved that his physician expressed the belief that he would get well to Mrs.
Witwer. When summoned again that night the suffering man in convulsions and
passed away in terrible agony.

A grewsome incident that the investigation has brought out is
that when her husband, William Stowe, died in Middletown Mrs. Witwer held the
light for the doctor who made the autopsy, and she performed the same service
for Dr. Broidenbach when he performed the autopsy on Witwer.

[“Mrs.
Witwer Now Held For Murder – Arraigned in Dayton, O., on Charge of Killing Anna
G. Pugh With Poison. – Other Crimes Suspected – Death of Seventeen Persons to
Be Laid to Her if Present Case is Proven. – Woman’s Strange Career.” Chicago
Tribune (Il.), Oct. 15, 1901, part 2, p. 1]

***

FULL
TEXT (Article 2 of 4): Hitherto the city of Dayton has been famous for its
soldiers’ home, but now it figures in the newspapers as the home of Mrs. Mary
Belle Witwer, who, if half the allegations made against her by professional and
amateur sleuths are true, is the life destroyer par excellence of the beginning
of the twentieth century, although some of the crimes she is said to have
committed must be charged up to the nineteenth.

Mrs.
Witwer has just had a hearing, preliminary in character, before the police
court on the charge of having poisoned her sister, Mrs. Anna C. Pugh. A number
of expert chemists testified in the case, and were emphatic in their statements
that arsenic had been found in the stomach of the dead woman. On the strength
of this testimony Mrs. Witwer was bound over to the court of common pleas,
without bond, to answer to the charge of murder in the first degree. The
accused maintained her composure when informed of the police magistrate’s
decision and displayed a stoicism which amazed the authorities and confounded
her attorneys. Many attempts have been made to entrap the prisoner, but they
failed miserably, and it is quite apparent that she will make a good defense
when her case is brought to trial before the court of record.

One fact
must not be forgotten by those who are inclined to discuss this cause celebre.
The evidence against Mrs. Witwer is purely circumstantial.

She
is now, of course, charged directly with the murder of Mrs. Pugh, who was a
professional nurse and lived with Mrs. Witwer, at No. 35 Liberty street,
Dayton. Mrs. Witwer lost four husbands, and all died rather suddenly and under
peculiar circumstances. In the wholesale charges informally made by police
officials she has been accused of having caused the death of all, in addition
to those of several children making a total of 14 deaths.

There
is, however, no expectation that more than one crime can be fastened upon the
prisoner; and even that is extremely doubtful, unless the authorities can
produce much stronger testimony at the coming trial in the criminal court than
they furnished before the police tribunal. Should the prosecuting attorney
succeed in proving the woman’s guilt in the Pugh case, other charges may be
taken up, but to the unbiased observer it seems as though the story of 14
mysterious murders will very likely evaporate in thin air. Moreover, even the
most relentless pursuers of the defendant are unable to associate any evidence
with the charges informally made.

A
short outline of the Pugh case is necessary to understand the present position
of Mrs. Witwer. Mrs. Pugh was ill not more than 48 hours and suffered great
anguish. Prior to her death she summoned a lawyer and dictated the terms of her
will. Mrs. Witwer was called in the room several times to refresh the patient’s
memory for names and address of legatees. She herself was a beneficiary only
upon the death of her mother, Mrs. Mary- Richmond, of Addison, Mich. Just as
the lawyer handed Mrs. Pugh a pen with which to sign the document she sank back
dead. Her estate, supposed to have been worth $4,000, has been reduced to
$2,500, of which $500 is in personal property and $2,000 in real estate – a
small farm near Franklin, O. Two applications for the administration of the
estate have been made, one by an attorney, at the suggestion of the Witwer
family, and the other by Mr. Nevis, on recommendation of the prisoner. The
latter is an inconsequential beneficiary. Mrs. Richmond is more than 80 years
old.

At
her death the estate is to be distributed among Mrs. Lizzie Brown and Mrs.
Witwer, of Dayton, O.; Nannie Parashot, of New York; Frank Richmond, of
Addison, Mich., and John Richmond, of Nashville, Tenn.

Mrs.
Witwer makes the assertion that her mother bought poison to kill rats which
were eating potatoes, but Mrs. Richmond denies the charge. While the police
were unable to find potatoes in the cellar when they made their first
investigation, they made another search and discovered some sweet potatoes near
a rat hole. These potatoes appeared to have been bitten by human teeth rather
than by rats, and by the police Mrs. Witwer was at once given credit for the
act in the hope that she might thereby deceive the detectives.

If
looks count for anything, the average observer would certainly not connect the
accused with any crime whatsoever. She is what women call a “good dresser,” and
does not look her age – 47.Her hair is
slightly tinged with gray and she has the bearing of a woman of intelligence
and refinement. In Dayton church circles she has long been well and favorably
known, having since her residence in the city been a member of the Hartford
street and Riverdale United Brethren congregations. She has been an active
member, taking a lively interest in home and foreign mission, and other church
affairs. While all of her friends are loathe to believe the charges against
her, yet none of them came to her aid after she had been formally accused, and
it devolved upon her neighbors to take an interest in her case, or she would
probably have been unrepresented at her preliminary trial.

Mrs.
Witwer’s marital history certainly is unique. Frank D. Witwer was the last of
her husbands who died suddenly. She was married to him last March, and on July
4 he died. Like all her husbands, he had stomach trouble a short time before
his death. He was taken violently ill some time after eating a luncheon which,
according to the sleuths, his wife sent to him. Mrs. Witwer’s first husband was
Frederick Sweinger, who died near Nashville, Tenn., in 1877, supposedly from
smallpox. The second husband was Frank Brown, of Middletown, O., with whom she
lived for several years. Soon after his death she married William Stowe, in
Middletown, and his death was strange and startling. Mrs. Witwer admits that he
died from morphine poisoning, but says a clergyman administered the fatal dose.

John
Williams, her next matrimonial venture, deserted her two days after the
wedding. She then came to Dayton and served as housekeeper for John E. Wenz,
who died from poisoning and a complication of diseases. While in the woods he
was poisoned by ivy, but there is a suspicion that poison was given to him
while in bed, as several physicians were unable to diagnose the ease. Mrs.
Witwer also acted as housekeeper for Mr. and Mrs. John Gabler, and both died
apparently from heart trouble within the few months she was in their employ.
George D. Keller, who resided in the east end of Dayton, died apparently from
cerebral meningitis, though his case puzzled two doctors, and it is asserted
that he was one of Mrs. Witwer’s victims. In Middletown, the police allege to
have found a woman who was intimate with the prisoner and who pays that, while
discussing their husbands one day, Mrs. Witwer remarked that to get rid of hers
“she would poison him.”

There
is no doubt that the police officials who have had charge of the case against
Mrs. Witwer have been honest and governed by the best of motives, yet the
impression prevails here that they have gone out of their way to create a
sensation. The woman may be guilty of the crime for which she is soon to be
tried, but the rumors upon which her notoriety as an American Lucretia Borgia
has been established are rather flimsy and hardly susceptible of being
introduced as testimony in a criminal court. Every town that has a little local
excitement nowadays has the ambition of making it a national episode, and the
peace officers of Dayton, swayed by this craze, would, some think, like to
surprise the world byweaving
a web in which the most cruel murderess of the age is to be caught.

And
while all this has been going on Mrs. Witwer has kept up an indifferent
attitude and asserted her innocence in terms forcible and logical. – Franklin
B. Betts

FULL
TEXT (Article 3 of 4): A few weeks ago Mary Belle Witwer of Dayton, Ohio, was
arrested upon suspicion of poisoning her sister, and is now held for trial.
Since her nearest neighbors and acquaintances of the woman have reported the
sudden death of twelve persons who have been associated with her, including
three husbands, five persons in whose families she had served as housekeeper,
and four children. It is due to Mrs. Witwer, however, to say that she stoutly
protests her innocence.

Close
upon the heels of the Witwer case follows the arraignment of Jane Toppan at
Barnstable, Mass., a professional nurse, upon the charge of murdering Mary D.
Gibbs, suspicions also resting upon her of murdering Mrs. Gordon, sister of
Mrs. Gibbs, and Mr. and Mrs. A. P. Davis, their father and mother, all of whom
had been attended by Jane Toppan in the capacity of nurse. She is also
suspected of the murder of three other persons. The evidence in this case seems
stronger than that against Mrs. Witwer. The accused woman shortly after their
decease attempted to commit suicide.

There
is an apparent lack of motive in the first case. Mrs. Witwer does not seem to
have profited in any way by the numerous deaths of which some think she may
have been the cause, nor does there appear to be any special reason way she
should have removed people in such a wholesale manner. Miss Toppan had been
employed as nurse in the Davis family for years, and in the Brigham family,
three members of which died suddenly, she was regarded almost as a daughter. It
is said that she owed Mr. Davis money and that some money which was on the person
of one of the women she nursed could not be found after her death. If money was
her motive her crimes got for her only about $1,200.

It Is
not safe yet to assume that either woman is guilty. If their guilt shall be
established, and if it shall appear also that Miss Toppan did not benefit in a
pecuniary way by the deaths laid at her door, it will have to be assumed that
both these, women had an abnormal love of killing, induced by that same species
of insanity which inspired Nero and Lucrezia Borgia in their alleged
butcheries.

FULL TEXT (Article 4 of 4):Dayton, O., Jan. 27 – The grand jury, because of lack of evidence,
yesterday ignored the case of Mrs. Mary Witwer, who was charged with poisoning
of her sister, Mrs. Pugh. The case attracted considerable attention last fall
[due to the] deaths of a number of persons were because of the allegation that
[they were] caused by Mrs. Witwer who had acted as a nurse. She will go to her
home in Michigan.

Monday, December 30, 2013

FULL TEXT: Sixteen peasants, each one
accused of poisoning husband or wife or relative in order to marry a lover or
get at an inheritance, are on trial in the district court of Passarovic [in Serbia].
Sketchy or even non-existent medical supervision in backwoods areas made
possible the long series of mysterious sudden deaths.

Blegrade, July. 30. – A sensational
poison trial has just begun in the district of court of the city of Passarovic,
Yugoslavia, a trial with few precedents in the history of all crime. Sixteen
peasants, men and women, have taken their places on the benches reserved for
the accused. They are variously charged with having expedited the death of a
husband or wife or close relation [note: all victims mentioned in this article
are male] by administering strong doses of poison.

The mere reading of the indictments
would offer pointers to the most dramatic of detective stories. Young peasant
women having allied themselves by marriage with rich, old men, then gave way to
a strong temptation to rid themselves of their burdensome husbands in order to
inherit their fortune and then marry their lovers. In other cases children
administered poisonous food to their fathers and thus entered quickly into
possession of their long-coveted patrimony.

~ MYSTERY ILLNESSES ~

Such horrible facts have been revealed
by the inquiry.

It had been noticed that the small
district of Krepoinija during 1936, 1937 and 1938 an unusual number of men in
perfectly healthy and robust condition died in strange and mysterious ways
after remarkably short illnesses. Suddenly they would be taken with terrible
pains, and, after a few days, would die in horrible suffering. Since medical
supervision is almost non-existent in the country districts of Yugoslavia, the
deceased were buried before anybody could establish the real causes of their
deaths.

Then one day Farmer Dragomir Pasojevic
presented himself at the local police station with a story for the chief.

~ POISON PLAN ~

“I have just overheard a conversation
between my brother Krsta and his wife, Persa Kolarcevic,” he said. “They are
planning to poison her father, who is eighty. He recently decided to get
married again. They wouldn’t stop at anything to keep from losing the
inheritance. Something must be done quickly.”

The police immediately started an investigation. Soon they
found that a couple of providing poison to the inhabitants of the locality.

A search was made of the Petcovic household. In the
clothes-closets the detectives discovered much arsenic and numerous pots and boxes
of dried, poisonous plants, and vials of snake venom. The quantity of noxious
material discovered at the Petcovics was sufficient to end the lives of the
entire population of the district.

~ MANY CLIENTS ~

Investigations revealed that the couple had cleverly
extended the circle of their acquaintances among the peasants of the locality
until they had gained the confidence of a large number. In this way they had
been able to line up possible clients who would pay well.

There is the case of Irina Pitic, now 22 years old, married
at 18 to a rich peasant of 68. nut everyone knew she loved a young shepherd who
would not marry her because she had no dowry. Irina had hoped that the old
peasant would die soon and leave her his fortune, but the old man was strong.
Meantime it was suggested to the young woman that she get rid of him with a
strong dose of arsenic. She finally agreed to the plan and at the end of the
week she was a widow.

A peasant woman, Militza, is charged with having put a
powder she got from the Petrovics in the soup she served her father, who was
76. she was his only heir and her husband was eager to get the inheritance
immediately, so as to be able to straighten out his financial situation.

Naum Novacovic, another peasant, and his wife are charged
with having poisoned their nephew, who had land from his father and mother. His
uncle, Naum Novacovic, had been named his guardian and trustee and they wanted
the boy’s fortune.

After eating the poisoned food he was served, the boy
collapsed with violent stomach pains, and developed a burning thirst.

He asked for a drink but his aunt refused him. The suffering
boy still had the strength to drag himself as far as the courtyard, where he
drank from a bottle of stagnant water. The next day he was completely
recovered. Naum Novacovic and his wife denied having tried to poison him.

Another woman is charged with having poisoned her husband
with whom she had lived for 42 years, with a powder obtained from the
Petrovics. She had for many years been the mistress of a young laborer on the
farm. Immediately upon the death of her husband, she began living openly with
this young man.

But among the cases listed in the indictment, that of Jagoda
Jeftic, 29, is without any doubt the most tragic. She is also accused of having
given her husband poison. On the day the funeral was taking place, the house
was full of mourners. Somehow the vial containing the remainder of the poison
fell into the hands of her son, who was only seven years old. The child drained
the vial and died two days later in the most terrible suffering. His funeral
was celebrated just four days after his father’s.

Saturday, December 21, 2013

FULL
TEXT: Over at Enid a colored preacher cited one of his flock, a husky dame with
a temper like a buzz saw, to appear before the church board to answer for
whipping her husband. On the appointed day the Amazon showed up on time, but
the dominie had got scared and had taken snap judgment on her and had dropped
her name from the church roll. She objected to being churched in this manner,
and when she got done carving that preacher with her razor it took three
doctors to keep him from bleeding to death. The woman is in jail, and the
preacher is in the hospital.

EXCERPT
(Article 1 of 2; excerpt from article on several cases): Two true bills were returned
yesterday in the case of Mrs. Josephine K. Eversich, who on July 25 twice shot her
husband because, it is said, he insisted on playing the gramophone. She first fired
a 22-calibre rifle, inflicting a slight wound in the arm, but later in the day she
shot him with a 32-calibre revolver, the ball entering Eversich’s left leg just
below the knee and shattering a bone. Eversich was in the hospital several weeks
and his wife was held a prisoner at the city jail until he was able to get about
and arrange bail for her. This case was set for trial tomorrow.

FULL
TEXT (Article 2 of 2): Mrs. Josephine Eversich who twice shot her husband,
Antonio Everisch on July 25, and who is now out on bail pending her trial for
that crime, attacked her husband again last night with a hatchet and drove him away
from the family home, 512 Thirty-fifth street.

After
being driven out of the house, Everich went to the police station to seek lodging
for the night and while »here he related to the officers the latest chapter of
his domestic troubles, he says that the row last night started over an apron
his wife was wearing When the supper dishes had been washed. Mrs Eversich announced
that she was going to visit her cousin, who lives nearby. Eversih told her to take
off the apron before she left the house.

~ Sets
Fire to Her Apron. ~

It
seems that this request or demand angered the woman and she set fire to the apron,
burning it up This provoked a quarrel which terminated when the woman grabbed up
a hatchet and made for her spouse. Remembering the graphophone incident, Eversich
decided that discretion was the belter part of valor and he did a “hot foot"
for the front door. Mrs. Eversich followed brandishing the weapon, and when she
found that her quarry had made his escape she told him that he had better spend
the night out as it wouldn't be healthy for him to return to the house.

~ Their
Happiness Not Complete. ~

Eversich
also told the police that since he was released from the hospital and his wife
from jail their happiness has been broken. They have quarreled frequently and
she has accused him on numerous occasions of having left the hospital, where he
was suffering
from a pistol-bullet wound in the left leg, and gone to the family home and made
off with the $32 which was taken from the place on the night following the shooting.
Everslch says that the charge is absurd as the bone in his leg was shattered by
the bullet and he could not walk a step. This accusation, he says, together with
other peculiar acts on the part of his wife has led him to the conclusion that she
is crazy.

~ Graphophone
the Cause. ~

The original
trouble between Evetsich and his wife started over a graphophone. On the morning
of Sunday, Julv 25 he wanted to play the machine and she wanted to sleep She told
him to stop the machine and when he refused, she shot him in the arm with a 22-calibre
rifle, inflicting a slight flesh wound. Again in the afternoon he wanted to play
the machine when she wanted to take a nap and on that occasion she used a 32-calibre
revolver and Eversich went to the hospital.

~ Couldn't
Stand the Jug. ~

Eversich
was limping slightly from the effects of the wound when he appeared at the police
station last night. He was dressed in his working clothes, consisting of a suit
of overalls, and he told the police that he would not he admitted to a hotel in
that garb. The station keeper said he could not sleep at the station unless he
wanted to be locked up in the "jug." Eversich declined this kind offer
and left the station house, stating that he supposed would have to lodge in a dry
goods box all night.

Mrs.
Eversich's case was called for a preliminary trial before Justice Christian
yesterday morning in the police court, but if had to be continued on account of
the illness of an important witness she was not arrested last night.

[“Mrs.
Eversich Again Attacks Her Husband – Armed With Hatchet, Woman Runs Her Spouse
Way from Home. – Man Asks Police for Shelter - Eversich Goes to Police Station to
took For Lodging For Night and Relates Latest Chapter of His Domestic Troubles to
the Officers. – Says Wife is Crazy.” Daily Press (Newport News, Va.), Sep. 11,
1909, p. 2]

Wednesday, December 18, 2013

1895:
back then it was called chivalry, today it is called feminism: the assumption
that a woman has a right to kill if she claims afterwards, even without a shred
of evidence that she was “abused” (a term that includes, according to
professional domestic violence operatives, virtually anything and slight that
upsets a woman, including a boyfriend (or non-boyfriend she regards as a
boyfriend) who does not return phone messages regularly enough).

In
2013, we have, in Canada, the spectre of law professor Elizabeth Sheehy calling
for the legalizing of pre-meditated homicide (provided that the killer provide
to the government a standard allegation of “abuse” of some type, or even a statement
she felt “afraid” for some reason or other – no need to prove or justify or
support with evidence of any kind).

It
becomes clear then that the “boring” old stuff that goes by the name of
“history” is increasingly pertinent value for those seeking to understand and
resist the authoritarian irrational cult called gender ideology.

Here
is an account from the mid-1890s showing how, despite the typical chivalric
inclinations of the average man (chivalry being a particularly strong ethos in
the South of the US South), a group of men organized themselves for the purpose
of formally demanding respect for the rights of males, despite the ages-old
tradition of female privilege that pervaded their nation.

***

FULL
TEXT (Article 1 of 2): Macon, Go., Aug. 8. – The voters of Twiggs County have
passed resolutions calling on the Governor not to interfere with the hanging of
Mrs. Dibble Nobles, who has been convicted of the murder of her husband."

~ THE
USUAL THING. ~

Several
weeks ago, when sentence was pronounced the women took up the idea that Mrs.
Nobles had been driven to her crime by the exactions of her husband, and they
started a petition to the Governor to commute her sentence. They wrote to
sister societies in other States, and already letters are coming in from New
York, Massachusetts, Illinois, and other States protesting against the death
sentence for a woman. So strong has the move become that the male citizens of
the county held a meeting and issued the following call for the protection of
men by the execution of the female murderess:

~
CURIOUS PROTEST. ~

"Whereas
public sentiment is such in this country and vicinity that if executive clemency
is granted under, each circumstances it would be difficult in future to prevent
lynch law for murderers,

"Therefore,
we earnestly protest against the extension in any form of executive clemency
for this murderess, polluted with the lifeblood of her husband, and do hereby declare
our perfect confidence in our chief magistrate and the belief that he will not
swerve from the performance of his sworn duty by a desire to cater to a weak
sentimentalism or transient public feeling, inspired, as be is, by a desire for
equal justice and the sacred execution of our laws."

~
THREE FORMER EXECUTIONS. ~

There
have been three women executed previously in Georgia a husband poisoner, about
100 years ago; a girl accomplice in a murder, about twenty years ago, and a
negro woman who was active in the notorious Eastman riot.

[“For The Protection of Men – Georgians Protest Against
Clemency for a Woman Man-killer. – She Must Die The Death - Curious Resolution
by Citizens of a Georgia County Looking to the Better Protection of Men From
the Vengeance of Women Who Are Murderously Inclined.” The Evening Times
(Washington, D.C.), Aug. 8, 1895, p. 2]

***

FULL TEXT (Article 2 of 2): What shall be done with the
women who murder with the knife or pistol pr poison?

In a Georgia case where a woman murdered her husband, the
governor is overwhelmed with petitions for her pardon, but it will be noted
that the people of the county where she lived have held a mass meeting to
protest against executive clemency.

In New York a strong effort will be made to save Marie
Herbert, the slayer of her seducer, from the death penalty.

Speaking of these cases in The New York Press says:

Generic man is more chivalrous than he is credited for
being. In recent years only one woman has been put to death for murder in the
state of New York. Three or four others have been sentenced to capital
punishment, since 1887, but their lives have been saved, mainly through popular
protests. “Protect the woman!” is the first sentiment heard when she becomes
involved in the meshes of law. indeed, the greater the crime, the more severe
the threatened punishment, the louder is raised the demand that she go
scathless or inadequately punished. In short, man practically has two codes –
one for rigorous punishment of male offenders, one of redress and rectification
for women who do wrong, save it be one in.

Our contemporary, The Memphis Commercial-Appeal, discusses
the question on the same line with the following illustrations:

Some of the most depraved criminals, some of the most
conscienceless homicides, have been females. The Druse woman, who was hanged in
New York a few years ago for killing her husband – chopping him to pieces with
an ax and secreting his remains – deserved her fate. The Georgia woman, Mr.
Nobles, who is now under sentence for hiring a negro to kill her aged husband,
went about her work with the coolness and premeditation of a fiend, and should
not be allowed to escape the severest punishment. These are instances fresh in
the mind, but the criminal calendar is foul with such cases of female
wickedness. In the Forum for August Major Griffiths, her majesty’s inspector of
prisons, mentions as cold-blooded and callous murderesses as Catherine Hays,
who caused her husband’s death and wished to cut off his head with a penknife
and boil it; Mrs. Mrs. Manning, who dug the grave for her victim three weeks
ahead, in front of her kitchen fire, where she roasted and ate a goose the
afternoon of the crime; Kate Webster, who dismembered the corpse of her
mistress and boiled it piecemeal; Mrs. Browning, who flogged her two
apprentices to death after starving them shamefully; Sarah Malcolm, the
charwoman, who committed a triple murder, incited thereto by the sight of her
mistress’s wealth in coin and silver plate. Mothers have murdered their
children fror the insurance money, while the typical poisoner, Anna Zwanziger,
followed poisoning for a livelihood. Any number of examples might easily be
placed in evidence where women are heartless as the “Mr. Williams” whose crimes
are written up by de Quncey. But the foregoing will suffice to substantiate the
position taken, that while but few woman are “born” criminals, as contended by
the Italian savants, Lombroso and Ferraro, some of them have been so lost to
humanity and committed crimes for which execution on the gallows or in the
electric chair could not be tortured into “outraging humanity.”

The Memphis paper holds that it is going a little too far to
exempt a woman from the penalty for a fiendish murder simply because she is a
woman. In the clear, cold light of justice and reason this conclusion seems to
be the right ones. If women wish to escape the death penalty, they should not
commit murder.

FULL TEXT: Hollywood, Feb. 20 – From Hollywood – no less –
pretty Spring Byington of the films set out today on a campaign to revise
California’s divorce laws with the declaration:

“Alimony has become a racket.”

The actress – she isn’t married – is campaigning for
introduction of a bill in the state legislature which would make the term of
alimony payments the same as the lenth of time the woman lived with her
husband.

“If alimony were awarded a woman only for a period of time
equal to the length of her married life, it would tend to fulfill the purpose
for which it was created.

“That is, a woman who has given the best years of her life
to a man would find financial protection, if she sought it. Conversely, these
marriages that last only a few months, or at the most a year, would not turn
out so profitably for the woman.”

She said that under no stretch of imagination could she see
“the justice in saddling, for perhaps many years, a man with alimony payments
who discovered after a comparatively short time that he had been married
specifically for his money.

“After all, the theory of alimony is to protect a woman who
has relinquished her ability to support herself. She deserves this protection.
But like many other laws that were well conceived, the alimony law is being
abused.

“It not only is providing thousands of undeserving ex-wives
with a comfortable living, but it has been twisted into a weapon by which women
vent their hatred on the men they once loved.”

Monday, December 16, 2013

FULL TEXT: “Women must be barred from criminal trials in
Fulton county [Georgia],” stated Mrs. Hattie Barnett, female detective, who has
been subpoenaed by the state.

“The courtroom of the average murder trial is merely the
training school where wives learn the tricks used by other women in killing
their husbands, and then go home, talk them over with their neighbors and then
use said tricks in ridding themselves of their husbands.”

Mrs. Barnett had a conference with Judge John B. Humphries
in regard to having the female of the species barred from sensational trials.
Mrs. Barnett stated further that she saw during the Abbott trial women offering
cooked chicken legs to court attaches in order to have the attaches reserve
seats for them.

“Women of this class brought their lunches and spent the
day, often bringing their
children of various ages with them. If I have to go to the legislature, I shall
get morbid women barred from such trials,” she completed.

Sunday, December 15, 2013

Ten
Cases, With Such Unusual Features as to Attract National Attention, Within a
Few Weeks, Emphasize a Remarkable Condition Which May Be Both a Development of
the New Woman Movement of the Baleful Fruit of the Extraordinary Leniency Shown
in the Courts of Women Accused of Murder

Public Attitude in Such Cases Shown
When St. Louis Coroner’s Juries Weep With Two Fair Defendants and Texas Judge
Has to Force Indictment of Another.

ARTICLE FULL TEXT:

~ Wives Recently Accused of Killing Husbands ~

– Following is a summary of the status of cases against
wives in the United States recently accused of killing their husbands.

– Matheson, Mrs. Lucy: Shot her husband in the home of a
negress. Indictment found with difficulty and jury acquitted her in 10 minutes.

– Stannard, Mrs. Laura: Accused of poisoning her husband
with a drug intended to stop him from drinking liquor. Acquitted.

– Mollicone, Mr. Assunta: Held for trial in Denver jail for the
murder of her husband.

– Valentine, Mrs. Eleanor: Held for trial in Denver jail for
the murder of her husband.

– Patterson, Mrs. Gertrude: Held for trial in Denver jail
for the murder of her husband.

– Quinn, Mrs. John M.: Two of her husbands mysteriously
murdered in homes. Wife says burglars committed crime. Held in Chicago for
investigation.

– Felton, Mrs. Moses: Shot her husband as he lay asleep.
Exonerated by Coroner’s jury on her statement man had threatened to kill her
before morning.

– James, Mrs. Alma Palmer: Shot her husband as he lay
asleep. Defense theory is it was a somnambulistic killing.

– Murray, Mrs. Clara: Shot her husband with cat rifle. Held
on daughter’s statements she threatened to kill man if he went to keep engagement
with another woman.

– Vermilya, Mrs. Louise: Held on charge of murdering
policeman Arthur Bisonette by poison. Suspected ofpoisoning Richard Smith and two husbands.
Pleaded not guilty and is in Chicago jail awaiting trial.

***

FULL TEXT: Not since the dark days in the Middle Ages
[Renaissance, actually, 1656] when 366 women are said to have formed a Roman Sisterhood of Death, and most of them poisoned husbands, has the world been
shocked by so many deaths caused by women as in the United States in the latter
days of the year 1911.

Within a few months writers for the press have been called
upon to recount an appalling series of crimes. If the cases that obtain
extensive publicity are criteria, they force the conclusion that more husbands
are being killed by wives by husbands.

It is cited, merely as a curious coincidence, that this
increase in the number of women’s crimes comes at a time when women are more
active in public affairs than ever before in history. Doubtless it would be
unfair to hint at any connection between the two conditions. The fact they
exist simultaneously is given for what it is worth. But it cannot be denied
that while some women are showing – rather convincingly, it must be admitted –
the right of the sex and political leadership, other women are showing with
equal conclusiveness the truth of Poet Kipling’s recent dogma, “The female of
the species is more deadly than the male.”

~ Women in History Often More Ferocious Than the Sterner Sex
~

The long list of recent crimes committed by women or
attributed to them bears out a theory held by the criminologists from Lombroso
down. And that is that while women are less inclined to acts of violence than
men, on account of their physical weakness, when they do become criminals their
crimes are characterized by a cruelty and relentlessness not found in male offenders.
[Editor's note: In my view, events and crimes, subsequent to 1911, show that
men can be as cruel as women: full sex-equality is demonstrated in sociopathy.
(St. Estephe)]

When a woman turns to murder she becomes ferocious. The
bloodiest murders of the French revolution were not half so cruel as the
fierce-eyed, wolfish females that urged them on. [Note: What this sentence identifies
is now known as “Proxy
violence,” a mode particularly favored by women (as well as political
leaders), whereby males are used to do the work.] Mme. Defarge, who sat at the
guillotine with her knitting and counted the heads as they fell into the
basket, was a true characteristic of them.

In the early biblical days Jael lured Sisera, the friend of
her house, to sleep, promising to shield him from his enemies, and as he slept
she took a nail and drove it through his temples and into the floor below. And
from that day until the last husband murder in today’s paper such crimes when
committed by woman have been unspeakably brutal and inhuman.

The idea of a woman turning murderess is so repugnant to the
average man that he scarcely can believe it possible. And the story of
society’s leniency to women criminals is as old as the mountains of India, as
old as the Ganges or the Nile, old as the pyramids with all their secrets. And
back of all of it is unwillingness of one man to believe that the women he
knows to be infinitely softer, more tender, more abhorrent of violence than he
could dabble her delicate hands in human blood. And some singer spoke the truth
when he said such things as this:

Cold eyelids, that hide like a jewel

Hard eyes that grow soft for an hour;

The heavy white limbs and the cruel

Red mouth like a venomous flower.

When these are gone by with their glories,

What shall rest of thee then, what remain,

O mystic and somber Dolores,

Our Lady of Pain?

~ Perhaps Leniency Toward Women Murderers Account for It ~

Whether this characteristic leniency of society toward women
malefactors is responsible for the Amazing increase of husband murders of late
is a matter, of course, of speculation. That criminologists should think so is
not to be wondered at.

The Anglo-Saxon people are pretty thoroughly convinced, as a
general thing, that capital punishment is a great deterrent of murder. The
thing is easy enough to demonstrate, the advocates of the extreme penalty say.
Switzerland abolished it and murders increased so rapidly that it was restored
as an experiment. Murders immediately decreased in number.

Practically the same thing has been found true in France.
For years the guillotine was in disrepute. And while its knife rusted in
idleness France gave to the world some of the most appalling murders in the
history of crime. The restoration of the death penalty was demanded by popular
necessary.

Even in the United States murders have increased in
commonwealths that have abolished the gallows. There is a great city on the
border line of the two mid-Western states in one of which hanging in the
extreme penalty for murder and the other life imprisonment. Newspaper men of
that city say they have had to record many more atrocious murders in the latter
than in the former.

If this be a true test, as it appears to be, justified by
the fact, the criminologists strengthen their theory by applying it to women
murderers. In late years but one woman has been put to death by process of law
for murder. This woman’s crime was committed in a [sic]Eastern state and was most atrocious. She
wished to be rid of her husband, with whom she had quarreled. She sent word she
wanted to make up and named a trysting place of their sweetheart days.

~ Texas Case May Become an Issue in Political Campaign ~

After they had kissed and made up they spent several house
there. The woman playfully picked up a rope and asked her husband to tie her
hands. He did so. She then said she bet she could tied his hands so he couldn’t
get away. Laughingly he let her try. She called a half-breed Indian boy to her
aid, when they had secured the man’s hands they deliberately murdered him and
threw his body into a stream.

Never was a more treacherous-crime committed. But when it
was announced the woman was to hang, the Governor of her State was swamped with
letters of protest. He withstood the pressure, however, and the sentence of
death was executed.

That case was an exception. Everywhere jurors simply refuse
to pronounce sentence of death against the women. In the rare cases when they
do, popular sympathy compels an executive commutation of sentence. Within the
last few weeks, readers of the Post-Dispatch will remember, at least two
Coroner’s juries have wept in sympathy with women who have killed their
husbands.

In the Forty-Eighth District Court of Texas the action of a
judge in compelling the indictment of a woman who had killed her husband will
be made a political issue. It is not impossible that the Judge will be defeated
for re-election on the strength of it. Popular sympathy is with the woman, and,
it must be admitted, that if murder is ever to be justified, the woman had a
claim upon his sympathy.

Mrs. Lucy Matheson was a child of 11 years when she met
Charles Matheson. She became betrothed to him a year later and was married to
him at 15. she was very pretty, a typical, well-bred Texas girl of good family
connections. She discovered that, 15 years before, Matheson had married a
negress in New Mexico, pretending that the woman was an Indian.

The influence of the negress continued after he married her.
One day the wife went to the Black woman’s home, found her husband there and
shot him to death.

~ Everything Done at Trial Is Favorable to Accused Women ~

Judge Blanton, at Fort Worth, called a grand jury together
and instructed them to look into the case. The jury reported it had no
indictments to return. The Judge sternly reminded them of the Matheson affair
and ordered them to do their duty, with a hint at citations for contempt if
they failed.

Tardily they returned an indictment. The woman was
immediately served with a warrant and 100 Abilene citizens, some of them
millionaires, offered to sign her bond. Two leading attorneys volunteered to
defend her.

The trial was altogether favorable to her. The jurors were
selected from the first 20 men called to the box. None was asked if he opposed
capital punishment. The woman told her story. There was a hint that the negroes
had shot at her and that she fired to protect her own life. It took the jury
about ten minutes to reach a verdict of acquittal.

This, of course, is an extraordinary case. If conditions
were reversed and a man stood in the same place, he also would have been
acquitted in short order by a Texas jury, for the South still recognizes pretty
clearly the right of every man – or woman – to preserve the sanctity of the
home.

A jury at Ontonogan, Mich., a few days ago returned a
verdict of acquittal for Mrs. Laura Stannard, charged with murdering her
husband. The woman is a believer in Spiritualism and is convinced that her
husband’s spirit was with her throughout the trial.

Stannard died at Greenland, Mich., last March and a
post-mortem examination proved that he had died of strychnine poisoning. He was
a habitual drinker and his wife was very anxious to break him of this habit. A
servant girl testified at the trial that Mrs. Stannard told her she had
intended to give her husband a tablet in his coffee to stop his drinking.

~ Three Women in One Jail for Causing Husbands’ Death ~

The theory of the defense was that Stannard took the poison
as a stimulant alter he had been on a spree, that he took an overdose and that
it killed him. The jury seem to hold to this theory also.

Three women are awaiting trial in adjoining cells in a
Denver (Colo.) jail for the murder of their husbands. They are Mrs. Assunta
Mollicone, an Italian; Mrs. Eleanor G. Valentine and Mrs. Gertude Patterson. In
each case the alleged motive is jealousy or cupidity.

Of these three the Patterson case is the most celebrated.
Mrs. Patterson was a poor girl of Sandoval, Ill., when she first met Emil
Strouss, a Chicago millionaire. Strouss took a fancy to her because she was
extremely beautiful, and arranged to educate her, sending her away to Paris.
When she had finished her schooling he called for her and they traveled about
Europe together.

After the return to America she met Charles A. Patterson, a
former collage athlete. He fell in love with her, she went to Los Angeles,
Cal., sent for him and he married her. Chance revealed to him her relations
with Strouss.

She confessed everything and he promised to forgive and help
her live down the past. She charges that, when they became hard up, he sold her
to Strouss for a monetary consideration. She charges that she finally refused
to hold up her benefactor for more money and that, in a quarrel, Patterson
attacked her and she killed him in self-defense. The killing took place in
Denver, where the Pattersons were keeping a select boarding house.

~ Her Two Husbands Killed as They Lay Sleeping Beside Her ~

Several days ago John M. Quinn was shot in his house in
Chicago and was killed. His wife, who called the police, said that a burglar
had committed the crime. When she was questioned by detectives she said that
Quinn was her second husband and that her first was a man named McDonald.

Subsequently it was found that she had been married twice
before. Her second husband was a man named Warren Thorpe. Investigation
revealed that Thorpe also was shot in his sleep when he and his wife were living
in Jackson, Mich., and that the woman said a burglar had done the crime. Her
two stories of the two crimes were remarkably alike in detail.

A thorough search was made of the Quinn home. Behind a
bathtub was found a revolver, one chamber of which had been discharged.

On the morning of Nov. 9 Moses Felton, a farmer of Macon,
Mo., was found dead in bed with a bullet hole through his head. His wife
notified the neighbors and said she had killed her husband. She told a pitiful
story and the Coroner’s jurors, in exonerating her, wept when they returned the
verdict.

She said she and Felton had quarreled about their daughter
the night before and that he had threatened to kill her. He had shown her a
revolver, she said, laid it near his bed and told her he was going to kill her
in the morning.

He lay down and went to sleep the wife added, leaving her to
pass the night awake and in terror. Once he awoke he reminded her that she had
but a few more hours to live. She waited until he dropped off to slumber again,
she said. Then she slipped out of bed, got the revolver and killed him.

~ Two Recent St. Louis Cases of Interest to Criminologists ~

St. Louis has produced two recent cases. Early on the
morning of April 28, Mrs. Alma Palmer James shot and killed her husband. Leo
James, as he lay asleep in their flat at 4457A Lexington avenue. The affair has
never been satisfactorily explained. When asked about the killing the woman had
but one answer, which she repeated over and over again in a dull way: “I don’t
care.”

At that time the theory was that Mrs. James killed her
husband because she had been infected with a serious disease and thought he was
responsible. This was disproved later, and the theory of the defense today is
that it was a somnambulistic crime, that she intended to kill herself, sat down
by her husband to think it over and fell asleep. The report of a pistol awoke
her and she found that, while she slept, she had shot her husband instead of
herself.

A St. Louis Coroner’s jury wept when it held Mrs. Clara Murray
for the death of her husband, who was shot while in his home, with a Christmas
gift cat rifle [nickname for a .22 caliber rifle]. The woman’s daughter, 9
years old, was the principal witness. She said her mother learned her father
had made an engagement with another woman, that her mother told him if he went
out she would shoot him, that he went out and the mother did shoot him.

A doctor who was passing the house told the jury that when
he reached the place soon after Murray fell, his wife had her arms about him
and was kissing him, saying, “Darling, wasn’t it all in fun?”

“No, the dying man said, “you shot me deliberately.”

Neighbors testified Mrs. Murray had been drinking whisky on
the afternoon of the killing.

~ Recent Cases Show Difficulty of Convicting Accused Women ~

The difficulty in getting convictions when women are
defendants was shown in the recent trial of Mrs. Zoe Runge McRee at Oplousas,
La. Mrs. McRee, a married woman, shot and killed Allen Garland, a young
neighbor, who was calling at her home. Her story was calling at her home. Her
story of it was that Garland made improper proposals to her and that she shot
in defense of her honor.

The prosecution contended that she and Garland had been
friendly for a long time. It offered evidence tending to show that Garland was
shot from behind as he sat in a chair. The trial resulted in a hung jury.

Taking these cases in connection with the recent accusations
against Nurse Vermilya in Chicago, accused of using poison for half a dozen
murders, more or less, and of another nurse, in New Orleans [Annie Crawford],
accused of poisoning members of her own family, the criminal activities charged
to women within the last few weeks present an amazing and startling ensemble.

[“Why Are So Many Wives Killing Their Husbands? -- Ten
Cases, With Such Unusual Features as to Attract National Attention, Within a
Few Weeks, Emphasize a Remarkable Condition Which May Be Both a Development of
the New Woman Movement of the Baleful Fruit of the Extraordinary Leniency Shown
in the Courts of Women Accused of Murder. – Public Attitude in Such Cases Shown
When St. Louis Coroner’s Juries Weep With Two Fair Defendants and Texas Judge
Has to Force Indictment of Another. ” St. Louis Dispatch (Mo.), Nov. 19, 1911,
part 2, p. 1]

Thursday, December 12, 2013

A new article lists ten female serial killer cases which
took place in Finland from 1750 through 1896.

The article, whose abstract is copied below, appears in a
special issue of the academic journal The
History of the Family, which is dedicated to exploring “patriarchal
values.” The author’s use of an obsolete definition of serial killers as being
exclusively of the male sex (which runs contrary to current U. S.
classification of serial killers, such as that used by the FBI) allows her to
develop a “non-patriarchal” term for the serial murder of newborns by a mother through the invention of an innocuous and vague new classification term “birth controller.” It might be argued that this proposal has a distinctly gynocentric quality to it.

***

Abstract: This article examines multiple infanticide in
early modern Finland in which the same woman killed several newborns after
repeated hidden pregnancies and childbirths. A well-documented case in Lohja,
Nummi and Pusula Court of Assizes in 1874 is compared with nine other recurrent
infanticides in Finland in the period 1750–1896. The context of the series of
crimes and the reasons why it took so long to apprehend the murderers differed
from the majority of reported infanticides, which were quite unplanned and the
perpetrators of which were apprehended within days of the act. These offenders
were serial killers who experienced a need to kill even if they were not
literally serial killers according to modern conceptions of male-oriented
serial killing. They did not deliberately get themselves pregnant with men in
order to obtain psychological gratification from killing newborn babies.
Rather, they resorted to killing several of their illegitimate babies as a
solution of birth control because their first such crime went unreported or
unprosecuted, probably as a result of the complicity of others. Such a
perpetrator in the early modern age is labeled a ‘love-child murderess’ or a
‘burker of newborns’, depending on her relationship with the father or fathers
of the victims. Serial killings of newborn babies as a solution of birth
control continue to exist in modern times as serial neonaticide. It is
suggested that a perpetrator of this category of crime in all ages be labeled a
‘birth controller’.

Wednesday, December 11, 2013

FULL
TEXT: When the good woman of Ludlow street died last week the debtors in the
county prison mourned. Two score of there are victims of their own mistakes or
the vengeance of their ex-wives The warden’s wife, Mrs. Sullivan was a woman
with a big heart. Her acquaintance with the prisoners consisted only of seeing
them at exercise. In the hollow square made by old Ludlow’s walls. Sometimes
prisoners fell ill and she sent dishes from her kitchen to them Now that there
is no woman in the jail they miss the sight of her moving about in her dining
room the windows of look out on the court

One-fourth
of the civil prisoners there have foundthat there is one woman too many
for comfort in their worlds. These are the five alimony prisoners locked up
because they have failed to pay the weekly or monthly allowance which the court
has fixed for their divorced wives.

Each
of the five subject to three months’ imprisonment. Then he may go free. It
happens that the alimony due from each of the five is under $500. If it was
more than that sum he could be kept in custody for six months

The
debts for which a man may be put in prison for a limited period now may be
classed as follows:

For
alimony due being adjudged in con tempt of court for not having paid it.

For
breach of promise, of a debt of honor which has so often been paid by a wedding
in court of Ludlow Street Jail.

For a
debt shown by execution where a conversion of property or a charge of fraud is
involved

For
wages to a domestic servant.

For
fines imposed by National Guard on its members.

These
five classes of debtors constitute the little colony which occupies the cells
set aside for civil prisoners in Warden Sullivan’s gloomy household.

Most
of the prisoners remain in jail because they cannot got bail demanded or pay
the judgments them. Some really can pay but have sequestrated their property
and are content to stay out the time of their important as a matter of spite or
obstinacy. Serving the period of imprisonment does not release their property
from the execution that stands against it but a man cannot be made to serve
more than six months at the outside for a debt if an ex-wife waits until the
alimony exceeds $500 she can imprison her former husband for six months. If the
amount be under $500 she can only put him away for three months.

The
life of the civil prisoner differs from that of prisoners accused or convicted
of crimes They are expected to pay for their own sustenance if they are able.
In order to get his meals at the expense of the county the civil prisoner must
make affidavit that he is unable to support himself during his imprisonment. If
he has money of his own or his friends have some at his command he may have as
many luxuries as he wants to buy; that is everything but liquor. The law says
that only cider and that quality of beer called table beer may be brought into
a jail for the use of a person confined therein, unless on the prescription of
a physician who declares that other liquor is necessary to the health of the
prisoner.

All
the civil prisoners now in Ludlow Street Jail are county fed. They have made
oath that they cannot support themselves, and just now the jail has not a
single star boarder of the type it has held to often. But they have some
luxuries bought with money sent to them by friends. Jars of preserves and
jellies are found in some of the cells. One of the prisoners is very fond of
potted chicken and always has several cans of it. Another has a friend who
indulges his taste in good cigars and keeps the Havana article in hermetically
sealed jars, in which the cigars retain their moisture and freshness.

Selling
liquor to the civil prisoners was common not so long ago. The saloon-keeper who
did the bulk of the business made a very clear trail for the officials to
follow when they discovered what was going on. For advertising purposes this
saloonkeeper had his name blown into the glass of the flasks which he supplied
to the prisoners. When the cells were ransacked all those bottles were
witnesses against him. At present the rule against liquor is strictly enforced.
A conviction of permitting it to be smuggled in would be equivalent to the
forfeiture of the Sheriff’s office.

The dean of the prisoners’ corps at present is William Real
de Krafft, who has been there since there since June 20, 1903. He is an
exceptional case. The action against him has not been brought to trial. As a
charge of fraud is involved in the civil suit he was required to give ball for
his appearance The bond was fixed at $1,000 but he has been unable to get it
and has stayed in custody. If judgment should be taken against him in the
action he can be kept in jail for not more than six months. Krafft is 62 years
old. He wants to get his case to trial oven if he loses it,because that will limit the time of the
imprisonment. The plaintiff is Otto F. Besse of Jersey City who says he
entrusted $50 to Krafft to invest in stocks for him.

Mr.
Krafft tried to get out a while ago and made a letter which he got from the
plaintiff the basis of an appeal to the court. Mr. Besse’s niece was about to
be married and he sent an invitation to Krafft. Krafft was hurt at this method
of exulting over his loss of liberty. But he didn’t succeed in winning the
decision of the court.

Krafft
is chairman of the committee which welcomes newcomers to the prison. The
alimony crew flock by themselves, as they have common sympathy to
exchange.Vincenzo Golletti is the
senior of three. He has been in since Dec. for falling to pay $120. Then came
William J. Shaw to join the colony row Years was just over when William T.
Mealy arrived Paul A. Perry came next. The latest arrival was John W. Ball who
has in just a month.

Of
those are in because of executions unsatisfied by their property and for which
there are E. Cosgrove has the largest sum against his name. He is related to an
influential Tammany politician but an the judgment was for a $15,000 was
demanded and in lieu of itHe is serving
six months. He’ll get out time for the Saratoga season.

A
slender boy of 22, who is raising a black beard during confinement is James A
Garfield a nephew of the late President Garfield a fortune. One of his
transactions with Benjamin L. Turner resulted in an execution against him for
$2,500. Friends have been to get him out. If they do not succeed he will not be
liberated until Aug. 17.

The
soldiers might called transient guests are usually out in three days at the
longest arrests am to failure to fine imposed for delinquencies. Last week
Warden Sullivan entertained two soldiers from the Ninth Regiment and one from
the Twelfth.

In former administrations it was extraordinary for the star
boarders who could afford to pay their way to eat at the warden’s table. The
rate of board was pretty big sometimes, the prisoners was mulcted for all he
could pay. Amendments to the code and a stricter enforcement of rules have done
away with the table. A warden may not charge any fee for sending for food which
a self-supporting prisoner may want.

[Theodore Roberts, “Ludlow St. Jail as I saw It From the
Inside,” The World (New York, N.Y.), Jul. 6, 1913, magazine section, p. 5?]